4. Building a Powerful Closing 

Tips for Closings

Incorporate much of the following to strengthen your closing:

• Plan your closing in detail. Memorize it if necessary.

• Integrate material from your introduction, referring to the analogy, rhetorical question, anecdote or data that you used. This is a powerful way to end and shows cohesiveness.

• Use an interesting technique – quote, question, anecdote, poem, joke, etc.

• Restate your central theme or summarize your key points.

• Point to the listeners’ need to know what you’ve just told them, and remind them of the urgency/importance of that information.

• Provide listeners with a “call-to-action” – clear action steps, prescribed behavior or mental activity they should do (call meeting to implement a solution; give you that budget increase).

• Acknowledge the important work and contribution of the audience.

• End early if possible, and offer to stay around for 15 – 20 minutes following the presentation to answer questions. The audience will know you care.

• Go for an emotional connection with the audience. Make them laugh. Make them cry. Make them think. Make them stand up and applaud.

Here are a few phrases to avoid:

• Well, I’m about out of time.
• I forgot to tell you. . .
• I’m being told I need to stop now.

 

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Adapted with permission from Soil and Water Conservation District Outreach: A Handbook for Program Development, Implementation and Evaluation. Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Division of Soil and Water Conservation, 2003.